386 Journal o f the neurological Sciences Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam - Printed in The Netherlands

World Federation of Neurology: Information

MINUTES OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE WORLD FEDERATION OF NEUROLOGY

(Neurological Institute, New York, 25 June, 1967)

The Minutes of the Executive Committee Meeting held in Vienna in September 1965 were accepted.

The following delegates or alternates were present: G. Poch (Argentina); J. Game (Austra- lia); H. Tschabitscher (Austria); L. van Bogaert (Belgium); J. Prichard (Canada); J. Mendoze- Vega (Colombia); F. Thiebaut (France); G. Schaltenbrand (West Germany); S. Allison (Great Britain); S. Katsuki (Japan); R. Selby (Malaysia); E. Herman (Poland); A. Subirana (Spain); Ihsan Siikrii Aksel (Turkey); A. Rose (U.S.A.)

The following countries were represented by proxy: Brazil (M. Critchley); Bulgaria (H. Tschabitscher); Czechoslovakia (E. Herman); Denmark (M. Critchley); East Germany (E. Herman); Hungary (M. Critchley); India (G. Robertson); Indonesia (M. Critchley); l ran (M. Critchley); Israel (M. Critchley); Mexico (M. Critchley); South Africa (M. Critchley); Sudan (M. Critchley); Taiwan (M. Critchley); Thailand (M. Critchley); Switzerland (F. Thie- baut).

The following officers were in attendance: President Macdonald Critchley; Vice-Presidents Graeme Robertson, F. Thiebaut and Raymond Adams; Secretary-General-Treasurer Henry Miller; Archivist Pearce Bailey.

Reports from Standing Committees

Policy Committee The President stated that the Policy Committee

recommended that the earlier scheme for decen- tralisation upon which a decision had been post- poned for two years, should now be postponed indefinitely. This decision was unanimously approved by the Executive.

It was the recommendation of the Policy Com- mittee that the Chairmen of the various Standing Committees, Committees and Sub-Committees who were not themselves delegates might serve on the Executive Committee of the WFN, but without powers to vote; furthermore, if any Committee Member was unable to attend a meet- ing of the appropriate Committee, he should not be empowered to suggest an alternate to act for

him, in that his nomination was personal and not national.

The suggestion from the Policy Committee that there should be a special committee on neurological training was discussed at this point, and more fully again below. The Executive Com- mittee agreed in principle that it might be useful to constitute a committee which in the first place should be fact-finding, and possibly later would make recommendations. The President was em- powered to discuss this with the Policy Commit- tee, and if necessary to constitute such a com- mittee on neurological education. The President was also empowered to choose the personnel for such a committee.

Constitution and Bye-Laws Committee Professor Schaltenbrand reported that (i)

the statutes of the Research Committee were approved by the Committee; (ii) the Committee have approved the Resolution of the Policy Committee to the effect that Chairmen of the various committees and sub-committees of the W.F.N. might be members of the Executive Committee but without powers of voting; fur- thermore, that if any Committee member was unable to attend a meeting, he should not be empowered to suggest an alternate to act for him, in that his nomination was personal and not national; Off) the Committee recommends that under Section 5, Finance Committee, A, of the Constitution and Bye-Laws, the words "at least" be inserted, so as to read "The Finance Committee shall consist of at least three mem- bers," and also that under Article 6, Section 3, the words "at least" should be inserted, so as to read "The Nominating Committee shall consist of at least five members."

The Executive Committee agreed with the a- bove recommendations, and went on to express the opinion that the Bye-Laws as a whole requir- ed re-examination and perhaps re-drafting.

Finance Committee The Secretary-General-Treasurer presented the

balance sheet of the accounts up to December 31st 1966. He pointed out that expenditure exceeded income to some extent, so that it was necessary to draw on capital. At the same time,

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WORLD FEDERATION OF NEUROLOGY: INFORMATION 387

a certain amount of the expenditure was non- recurring, arising as it did from the transfer of the secretariat from Antwerp to London.

The Executive Committee approved the balance sheet, and were of the opinion that in future they should be audited by Chartered Accountants.

A list of defaulting countries was named, with the recommendation that a reminder be sent out.

I t was noted that the finances of the Research Committee were a separate responsibility, and it was agreed that the Secretary-General-Treas- urer should receive a statement of accounts from the Secretary Treasurer of the Research Commit- tee in time to incorporate it within the annual balance sheet of the W.F.N., and also in the President's Annual Report.

Nominating Committee The President reported that the following have

been suggested for membership of the Policy Committee: R. de Jong, G. Schaltenbrand, S. Refsum, H. Tschabitscher, R. Masland and P. Castaigne.

As Dr. de Jong is not a national delegate, it was agreed that he should be appointed a mem- ber of the Policy Committee pending the revision of the Constitution and Bye-Laws. This should also be applied to others in the same situation.

Finance Committee The following were suggested for membership

of the Finance Committee: Roland Mackay (or failing him, T. Lehoczky), John Game, M. Jecquier, E. Kivalo, J. Bonduelle, Almeida Lima and J. Prichard. The Executive Committee gave their approval.

Journal of the Neurological Sciences The Secretary-General-Treasurer read the re-

port of the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal in the absence of Dr. J. N. Walton, as follows: "When I took over as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Neurological Sciences from Dr. Macdonald Critchley on 1st January, 1966, Dr. Critchley pointed out to me that a serious position had arisen with regard to publication delays in that he had already received a sufficient number of good publications to fill every issue of the Journal for almost two years at the present rate of publi- cation. Subsequently, therefore, following dis- cussions in the World Federation and with the Elsevier Publishing Company, it was agreed that as from 1st January 1967 the size of each two- monthly issue of the Journal would be doubled. Inevitably this resulted in a substantial increase in price, but to date this has had no detrimental effect upon the circulation. The present position is as follows.

The total circulation of the Journal at 1st

January 1966 was 671 copies. At 31st December 1966 the circulation had risen to 805, and by 30th April 1967 there had been 725 renewals for the current year, though the publishers anticipate that many more will come in within the course of the next few months. Plainly, therefore, the circu- lation of the Journal is slowly improving, but it is not as yet satisfactory and it is particularly dis- appointing that the number of subscribers in Great Britain, in the United States and in Canada is substantially less than was originally hoped. To give an example, only 26 copies are at present sold in Great Britain compared with 29 in China, 28 in Japan and 47 in The Netherlands. The circulation of the Journal in the United States is only one-third of the circulation of its predeces- sor, World Neurology. The Elsevier Publishing Company are fully prepared to continue to publish the Journal indefinitely, as they believe it is one that is likely to have a slow growth rate in circulation and they have the impression that interest inthe Journal is slowly increasing through- out the world. Shortly they propose, after con- sultation, to undertake a promotion campaign in order to sell more subscriptions, particularly in Britain and in the United States and Canada. The present position is that if a further 100-150 copies are sold annually, the Journal will more than cover its cost of publication.

Articles awaiting publication. Following the increase in the size of each issue from the begin- ning of 1967, the backlog of papers awaiting publication has almost been absorbed and the situation now is that thirty-four papers have to date been accepted for publication. The last of these to have been accepted will be published in the first issue of 1968, so that the waiting period for publication is now down to nine months and it is hoped to maintain it at no more than this in the future. Papers awaiting publication have come from Germany, France, Morocco, Italy, United States, Canada, Australia, the USSR, Poland, The Netherlands, Japan, Czechoslova- kia, Belgium, Israel, Yugoslavia and Korea, so that the Journal appears to be maintaining its international coverage.

Within the last year papers have been publish- ed in English (about two-thirds), French (about one-sixth) and German (about one-sixth) and only one paper has appeared in the Spanish language. An English summary is being publish- ed at the end of each article in French, German or Spanish, but the policy of continuing to produce summaries of all papers in several lan- guages did not appear to justify its cost and has been discontinued.

Papers of an increasingly high quality are now being received by the Journal. They not only show a wide international coverage, but also cover clinical neurology, historical topics, neuro-

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388 WORLD FEDERATION OF NEUROLOGY: INFORMATION

anatomy, neurophysiology, neuropathology and a wide variety of modern scientific methods utilis- ed in neurological diagnosis and management.

Conclusions. It may therefore be concluded that the Journal is making satisfactory progress and the publishers are happy with the present situation. The single difficulty at the moment is the question of the circulation, which it is hoped will steadily increase over the course of the next two or three years, and it is suggested that dele- gates to the WFN may perhaps be willing to suggest that more of their members in various countries subscribe either individually or through departmental libraries to the Journal in the future."

The Editor's Report was accepted.

Research Committee o f the WFN The President stated: "At a meeting in Geneva

held on July 1st and 2nd, 1966 was born the Committee of Research of the World Federation of Neurology, to be made up of the Secretaries of the various Research Groups (formerly called Problem Commissions), Officers of the WFN, L. van Bogaert (President-Fondateur) and a Chairman and a Secretary, Professors Frances- chetti and Klein respectively. Thus this new Committee was to take the place of what had been termed the World Association of Neurolog- ical Commissions or WANC. As this Commit- tee was to handle funds, specific statutes were needed. They have been drawn up and the final version is at present before you, and has been formally approved.

Meanwhile, earlier this year the annual report of the President of the World Federation of Neurology was prepared and circulated, prima- rily to the national delegates. Some of the mem- bers of the Research Committee took offence at the use of the expression "dissolution", and secondly at what was deemed to imply unworthy motives surrounding the original formation of WANC.

At the most recent meeting of the Research Committee held in Geneva on May 27th* it almost looked at one time as if all scientific work was to be still further delayed indefinitely. How- ever, oil was eventually poured upon the troubl- ed waters. The price of peace was a proclama- tion drawn up as coming from the President of the WFN to be read aloud at this Executive Commit- tee meeting. I will, therefore, ask Professor Miller to read out this document."

Professor H. Miller then read out the follow- ing Resolution:

"The Council of the Research Committee of the World Federation of Neurology, at its meet- ing in Geneva on 27th May, 1967, again express-

* See J. neuroL Sci., (1968) 6: 193-195.

ed regret concerning the misunderstandings wich had arisen between the Executive Com- mittee of the World Association of Neurological Commissions (WANC) on the one hand and the President of the World Federation of Neurology on the other. They re-affirmed that the W A N C was never intended to be a rival organisation to the WFN but that it was always proposed, fol- lowing its foundation meeting in Antwerp in 1964, that the WANC would operate wholly within the framework of the WFN. They wish to point out that the statement in the Report of the President of the WFN for 1966 that the WANC had now been dissolved was in their opinion incorrect, but that according to the agreed Resolution passed in Geneva on 2nd July 1966 the organisation was reconstituted as the Research Committee of the WFN.

The President of the WFN also expressed re- gret if he had misinterpreted in his letter to the delegates and Annual Report the spirit and inten- tion of the original formation of the WANC.

It was agreed that following unanimous ap- proval by the Council of its new Statutes, the Research Committee of the WFN intended in the future to work harmoniously together to further the cause of world-wide research in the neurolog- ical sciences."

There was no discussion The President made the following announce-

ment: (i) that the membership of the new Nominating

Committee should be as follows: G. Robertson, A. Biemond, G. Milton Shy, E. Kugelberg and S. Sarkisov. In the event that Professor Sarkisov is unable to serve, it is recommended that Dr. Augustus Rose be invited to do so.

(ii) that the membership of the Committee on Constitution and Bye-Laws should be as follows: E. Bay, C. Kane, F. Lhermitte and M. Valasco Suarez; in addition the following members of the old Committee: G. Schaltenbrand, I.S. Aksel, G. Poch and A. Rose.

The President intimated that he had taken steps to constitute a number of new Research Groups on the following topics:

(a) headache and migraine; (b) multiple sclerosis; (c) developmental dyslexia and world illitera-

cy; (d) neurotropic virus disorders, especially the

slow virus diseases of the nervous system; (e) cerebrovascular degeneration; (f) head injuries and their sequelae (in co-opera-

tion with the World Federation of Neurosurgical Societies).

The possibility of yet another Research Group to deal with the place of ultrasonics in neurology was mentioned.

The membership of the various Research

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WORLD FEDERATION OF NEUROLOGY: INFORMATION 389

Groups was announced, and it was stated that a Symposium on Headache and Migraine would probably be held some time in 1968 in the U.S.A., and that a Symposium on Developmental Dys- lexia would take place early in April 1968 in Dallas, Texas.

It was announced that a new Handbook deal- ing with the activities of the WFN would be print- ed and become available by the end of the year.

Membership of the Liaison Committees was announced as follows:

(a) with the World Psychiatric Association: A. Rose, W. Gooddy, Sanchez Longo, G. Gastaldi and E. Herman;

(b) with the International Neuropsychology Society: E. Bay, A. L. Benton, H. H6caen, C. Mendilaharsu and M. Critchley;

(c) with the World Federation of Neurosurgic- al Societies: J. Foley, R. Gilliatt, E. Bharucha, B. Olivarius and K. Henner;

(d) with the International Congress of Neurol- ogy: Melvin Yahr, H. Tschabitscher, Almeida Lima, A. Kreindler and M. Critchley.

The foregoing names were approved. It was stated that the names of members of the Liaison Committee with the International Neuropatho- logical Society would not be available before October 1967.

The President announced and the Executive Committee approved the entry of Sudan, Malay- sia, Nigeria and Malta within the fabric of the WFN. The President also stated that he hoped that applications would shortly reach him from Pakistan, Ceylon, South Korea and Senegal.

Dr. John Game and Dr. Graeme Robertson spoke on the projected postgraduate centre for neurological training in Melbourne to serve the needs of the Asian-Pacific countries.TbeExecutive Committee of the WFN gave enthusiastic support to this project, and the President promis- ed to send a written statement to this effect if necessary.

The President referred once again to the ques- tion of the WFN collecting data as to systems of neurological training in various parts of the world. The advisability of an ad hoc committee was re-affirmed, and the President was instructed to take steps in collaboration with the Policy Committee.

A statement of confidence in the President and a vote of thanks was expressed by Dr. Graeme Robertson.

HENRY MILLER Secretary-General-Treasurer

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